Country Music's Greatest Lines

Bobby Braddock, the only living songwriter to have written number-one country songs in five consecutive decades, celebrates standout lines in more than eighty country masterpieces. Unique stories give the reader a behind-the-scenes look at classics from Hank Williams, Bill Anderson, Roger Miller and Merle Haggard, as well as twenty-first-century icons like Alan Jackson, Taylor Swift and Eric Church. Artist Carmen Beecher brings these tales to vivid life with strikingly realistic illustrations of seldom-seen songwriters, easily recognizable superstars and unforgettable song characters. From late 1940s jukebox hits to present-day chart toppers, Braddock and Beecher offer a magical journey from the songwriter's pen to the singer's lips to the listener's ear.

Braddock's acute songwriter's ear and keen eye for detail make him the ideal choice to author a book with this unusual angle. He selects exactly the right lines for each tune, whether they reflect the wordplay inventiveness of I'm a man of means/By no means, from Roger Miller's King of the Road, or the simple poignancy of this passage from Alan Jackson's Remember When, I remember when the sound of little feet/Was the music we danced to/Week-to-week. We see how stand-alone powerful and effective a few well-crafted lines can be, even when removed from the context of the entire song. But we also learn that our songwriting idols can have, on occasion, the proverbial feet of clay. In one chapter, Braddock spots a syntax error in Hank Williams' I Can't Help It (If I'm Still in Love With You), stating the example in a self-deprecating, lighthearted manner. Further proof that you can often bend the rules of grammar and still come out a successful songwriter. Sounds like Nashville.

Whether you're a serious historian or simply an avid country music fan, you'll want to put Country Music's Greatest Lines on your must read list.

Collated by Bobby Braddock, inducted into Nashville Songwriters, Country Music, and (New York's) Songwriters Halls of Fame, we find this book a connoisseur's appreciation of the genre. He knows, because he's written and played country music, as well as studied its antecedents. Decatur Daily
Country's Greatest Lines works as an insider's take on the business of country, and it also sent me to a dozen records I wanted to hear immediately. Braddock and Beecher evoke the mythology of country without sentimentalizing the music or its creators. It's a remarkable achievement. Nashville Scene
Country songs, from Hank Williams till today, remain faithful to their tradition of reminding their listeners about the life they live. Braddock, a 60-year creator of songs, remembered that when he decided to write this book. American Song Writer

Inducted into the Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame, Country Music Hall of Fame and the Songwriters Hall of Fame (NY), Bobby Braddock also earned the BMI Icon Award, the ACM Poets Award and six CMA Song of the Year nominations, winning twice. Carmen Beecher has paintings in the Pentagon's Air Force Art Collection and has awards for Air Force Published Graphic Art and Fine Arts Drawing. Her painting River of Tears was selected for the 2008 Juried Art Exhibition at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine.

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